Читаем White River Burning полностью

“I followed the directions. I’m there in the alley at the right time, waiting. I’m there maybe twenty minutes. Then I get a text changing the plan, telling me I should drive to the far side of the Grinton Bridge. So I do. And I wait. After a couple of minutes, I get a third text. This one expresses some concern about surveillance, says we need to postpone the meeting until it’s safer. I drive home to my apartment. I’m thinking, that’s the end of that. Until I get a new text a couple of days later. This time it’s a big rush. I have to drive immediately to a house up on Poulter Street in Bluestone. I’m supposed to drive straight into the garage and wait. I manage to get there on time; and I’m waiting, waiting, waiting. After a while I’m thinking maybe I misunderstood. Maybe whoever’s got the video is waiting in the house. I get out of the car and go to the side door. It’s unlocked. I open it. Then I hear a sound that could be a gunshot. From somewhere in the house. So I get the hell out. I jump in my car. Tear out of there. Drive home. End of story.”

“You drove directly to your own apartment?”

“To a parking spot near it. About a block away.”

“Any further messages from your supposed tipster?”

“Nothing.”

“Did you save the texts?”

“No. I wrote down the number they came from, but I deleted the actual texts.”

“Why?”

“A precaution. I’m always afraid of phone hackers or someone getting hold of private information. And this was a supersensitive thing, the dashboard video. If the wrong people found out I was going to be getting it . . .” His voice trailed off.

“Did you ever call the number the texts came from?”

“I tried maybe five, six times. No answer, just anonymous voicemail. I remember thinking maybe they had been in that house after all, and maybe they got shot. Then this morning RAM-TV runs this story on the places where the sniper shots were fired from. Up till then, all they’d talked about was where the cops were when they got shot, not where the bullets came from. But now they showed the apartment building on Bridge Street and the private house on Poulter Street, with some asshole reporter standing in the street pointing at it. I’m thinking, shit, that’s where I was, I was in both of those places. I’m thinking, what the fuck’s going on? I mean it was obvious that something weird was going on. Put that on top of the Flynn bullshit—with the great police chief pointing his goddamn finger at me—and I’m thinking, What the fuck? What the bloody fuck?”

Payne was sitting on the edge of his seat, rubbing his thighs with the palms of his hands as if he were trying to warm them, shaking his head and staring a little wildly at the floor.

“There are fingerprints,” Gurney said mildly, “in both locations.”

“My fingerprints?”

“That’s what I’ve heard.”

“That has to be a mistake.”

“Could be.” Gurney shrugged. “If it’s not, do you have any idea how they could have gotten there?”

“The only place my fingerprints could be would be in the car, which I never left, except to open the side door of the house. But I never went inside. And at the apartment building I stayed down in the alley. In the car. I never got out of it.”

“Do you own a gun?”

Payne shook his head, almost violently. “I hate guns.”

“Do you keep any kind of ammunition in your apartment?”

“Bullets? No. Of course not. What would I do with them?” He paused, looking suddenly dumbfounded. “Fuck! Are you saying someone found bullets in my apartment?”

Gurney said nothing.

“Because if someone’s saying they found bullets in my apartment, that’s total bullshit! What the fuck is going on?”

“What do you think is going on?”

Payne closed his eyes and took a long, slow breath. He opened them and met Gurney’s inquisitive gaze with an unblinking Beckert stare. “It would appear that someone is trying to frame me, someone who’s covering up for whoever was actually involved in the shootings.”

“Do you believe your father is trying to frame you?”

He continued staring at Gurney, as if he hadn’t heard the question. Then the hard expression began to break down. There were little tremors around his eyes and mouth. He stood up abruptly, turned away, and walked to the window that looked out on the old graveyard.

Gurney waited.

A long minute passed.